When people see some of the student-made movies, they somethings thing that they are made by adults and not by actual students. I guess this is a compliment in a way, thinking that there is no way that young students make movies that are so good.

Below are a few examples of raw footage from both "Jose the Magician" and Timmy's Time Machine" movies. I'll include the actual movies as well. In these clips you will clearly hear the student directors controlling each shot.

It is important to me as I design this iPad curriculum that it is not only authentic but also doable by young students.

Enjoy,

​Brad

Badges Update: in other news, I am currently working on the videography badges. As you can imagine, these badges are very time consuming to make. I hope to have them done by mid-February.

Whew! I have finished two badges in one week and I'm exhausted. As I mentioned before, I have never made it to Level 4 badges before. But this week things changed and I was finally able to push through and made my first Level 4 badge.

Since badges get harder as they get to higher levels, so it forces me to become the expert as I teach the skills to your students with my badges tech curriculum program.

My students are always begging me to teach them how to take great photos of people, so I torture them by making them learn other photography skills before I set the loose on each other. I did the same thing with my badges; first we started with the basics in Level 1, then we moved onto photographing objects in Level 2, now for Level 3 they are finally ready to photograph people.

For those of us who design curriculum for younger students, we struggle with the paradox of showing examples made by other students. Especially when it comes to tech projects.

On one hand, it can be really good thing for those students who don't understand what the lesson is about. "Oh, I get it. You want me to play the guitar on my iPad."

On the other hand, it can stifle creativity. Students are really good a copying each other. So once they see the student-made example, chances are they will try to copy it.

But for me, I've chosen to keep the student examples as part of my badges program for elementary school for the simple reason is that it sets the bar of what is possible. You see, I like to push students beyond what they think is possible and one of the ways I do this is by showing them something one of their peers make. If I were to just some them something I did, they could think, "Yeah, but you're an adult. Of course you can make a movie." But by showing them a movie, or anything else, it shows them that they can do. And for my competitive student, if gives them something to beat.

I just got my order for new badge "look" back from Fiverr and I couldn’t be happier.

My badges before were just text on a badge, whereas the new ones reflect a more age-appropriate look -- a cartoon look that I think the students will really like to have on their backpacks. I felt it was important as I designed this new elementary technology curriculum that I made the changes from the feedback that the students had given me. And many said that they did not like the look of the badges.

Most of the videos you see in this badge have been shot many times as I worked out the way that I wanted to produce the new badges.

The first thing that you should notice is the improved quality. The video is now HD which makes it so much easier to see what I am doing on the iPad and you can now count the hairs in my beard. The second this in the improved audio. Although I am still fighting a slight echo in my studio, I am sure that with enough sound absorbing panels, that too will be fixed soon.

The format is also different and It's shorter; I cut about half the time out of the previous low level photography badge.

I hope you enjoy and please drop me a line with any feedback that you might have. ​

One of the things my students asked for was an easier to navigate interface and when I sat down with them to discuss ways I could do it, one of them came up with a rating system.

The lowest of the rating would be the Grandma. Each badge would get one to five "Grandmas" to represent how impressed your grandma would be if you learned these skills. It also represents the likelihood of you having to teach your grandma how to do it.

The next would be the adults - your parents and teachers, just how impressed would they be with the tech skills taught in this badge. A five out of five rating might mean that your parents would by you a pony they would be so blown away by what you could do with your tech.

And the last level would be your peers, your fellow students. The toughest of all the crowds to impress. If you can do a badge that has a rating of 5 on this level, then you've made and you probably be elected to class president and be the greatest techie in your grade.

The iPad Photography Level 1 badge would be like this:

Grandma (4 stars)Adult (3 stars)Student (3 stars)

As an elementary technology curriculum my badges program will allow students to find the badges that interest them the most, even if that means that their grandma will be very impressed too.

Over all the years that I have been doing tech badges with my students I have amassed quite a few different badges, and of all those badges, which one do I pick to be the first one I completely redo?

Photography.

"Why photography?" you might ask.

It has been my experience that using students using their iPads as a camera is one of the most popular uses of iPads in the classroom. In fact, I think it is only second to using iPads for research. So it makes sense that it would be my first one to completely redesign.

The truth is, a lot of elementary students take pretty crappy photos using their iPads, so hopefully, this badge will be a part of the solution instead of adding to the problem. The new Photography Badge will be broken down into 4 levels:

Over the summer I had a logo for MyTechBadges.com made by a very talented graphic designer from Fiverr.com. I told him I wanted something appropriate but fun. As I redo all the videos and the curriculum I will use the logo in my videos - some branding so everyone knows and recognizes it as being from me. I want elementary students to feel connected to the logo and I think I got exactly what I wanted.